GRAND RAPIDS -- It was all about the details Friday when City Clerk Lauri Parks and her staff ran an accuracy test of the city's voting system before the Aug. 5 primary election.

"Before we take the ballots out, everyone removes the liquids from the table," instructed Deputy Clerk Marie Gowell as she set aside her paper coffee cup.

Gowell, who estimated she's had a hand in about 100 elections, knows what can happen if drinks are spilled on pre-printed ballots that need to be machine-counted.

Then it was all business for the small group that had gathered in a warehouse where the city stores its voting machines, ballot boxes, booths and other equipment needed to stage an election in Grand Rapids' 100 precincts.

The random tests are required by the state before each election to ensure the machines can and will accurately count each ballot that is cast.

City Assessor Glenn Beekman and City Attorney Catherine Mish -- members of the city's Elections Commission -- spun a plastic bingo ball to select which 10 of the city's 100 machines would be tested.

Each of the machines was ready to take ballots prepared in advance to test every possible voting scenario. Workers even prepared spoiled ballots and crossed party lines to make sure the machines would spit them out instead of counting them.

"You will be able to do it in November, but you can't cross party lines in the primary election," Parks said.

Once they selected which machines to test, Parks and her crew went to work. After running a "zero" tape to make sure the machine held no votes at the outset of the test, they fed 33 prepared test ballots into each machine.

After the ballots were run through the machines, they printed out a second set of tapes. They carefully documented and signed the results before putting them in a steel lockbox.

While Friday's test was completed in about an hour, it took days to prepare, Parks said. Each one of the machines had been pre-tested prior to Friday's public test.

Because each one of the city's 100 precincts requires a different ballot, they had prepared a total of 3,300 test ballots -- a task that took five or six workers three days to accomplish earlier this month.

"It seems like we're always either getting ready for an election or wrapping up from one," said Parks, who was appointed in March.

"There are a lot of checks and balances that go on behind the scenes to get ready for an election day," said Parks, who went through her first election cycle with the May school election.

Though Parks is new to the job, she has lots of experienced help. The four employees who helped run Friday's test estimated they have been involved in running more than 300 elections.

Gowell, who plans to retire in September, has been running elections since 1978, when she was hired by the city of Grandville. She served as Kent County's election director before joining the city in 1989.

Despite all of her experience, the testing process and backup systems, Gowell said she doesn't take the job for granted.

"I don't sleep the nights before elections," she said. "Oh God. Are you kidding?"